Grissom appraised his team over the rim of his titanium eyeglasses. "I know it's been quiet for a few hours, but your break is about to end. We've gotten three calls in the last fifteen minutes."
"Bonus," Sara grinned. "I hate paperwork."
Adopting an amused expression in reply, Grissom directed, "Sara, you and Nick take the DB at the Monaco. Warrick's got a 416 out in Devil's Canyon - trip to make-out point turned assault - and Catherine's with me on the missing person."
Sara stood, grumbling good-naturedly about working with Nick. "Hey, Grissom," she called on her way out, "if he takes his shoes off in the Tahoe again, do I get hazard pay?"
"Next time I catch you singin', I'm gonna set up a video camera and sell it to one of those blooper shows," Nick threatened.
"At least you two *got* partners. I get to work an assault all by myself. You know how much evidence an assault can generate?" Warrick complained.
"Must be a full moon," Catherine commented, reaching for her jacket and then into the mini-fridge for a bottle of water. "Everyone's got the Whinies."
"The Whinies?" Grissom eyed her as they walked to the parking lot. They seemed to be in silent agreement as they headed for Catherine's SUV.
Catherine slid a hand into the back pocket of her black pants, pulling her keys out. "The Whinies," she explained quickly, "a relative of the 'Why Me' disease. That's what I call it when Lindsey starts whining about teachers who 'hate' her, or boys who don't notice her. I tell her she's got a bad case of the 'Why Me's, and when she was little, she called it the Whinies."
"There's actually some logic to that," Grissom said approvingly.
"Why, thank you." Catherine grinned at him as he climbed in, and she started the car. "Where's this scene?"
"Andover Street. It's off East Trop, near Boulder."
Pulling out into traffic, Catherine switched the radio on automatically. Grissom wasn't one for idle conversation, and she didn't have much of importance to say. They rode to the scene with the drone of classic rock piped softly into the background, surrounded by the comfortable silence of old friends.
"Make a right here," Grissom instructed as they reached a dead end. "We're going around the back."
True enough, they came out behind the house, the flashing red-and-blue visible over the top of the one-story ranch style abode. Catherine parked, and they walked through the neighbor's yard around to the front of the house, each taking their own mental notes, to be compared on the drive back.
"You the lab rats?"
Catherine forced a smile onto her face and responded before Grissom could. "We're the *CSIs*," she enunciated. "Gil Grissom and Catherine Willows. You the first on scene?"
"That's me," the officer replied, as they strode up to the front porch.
Grissom allowed a thirty-second pause before he tried to move the conversation along. "Are you going to tell us what happened, Officer Richter," Grissom asked, reading the man's badge, "or do we have to do everything here?"
Richter sighed the sigh of someone who's been suckered. "Lady called nine-one-one, said her husband was kidnapped. She's screamin', hysterical, and dispatch can't get more than that outta her. 'My husband's gone, they took him. The house was all locked up, and now he's gone.' So dispatch sends me an' my partner, that's him, over there," the uniformed officer pointed back to his squad car, "Jerry DeSalvo. Dispatch sends us over to calm her down and see what else we can get. So we get here, and--"
"Excuse me," Grissom interrupted, gesturing to the front door, "but was the door locked when you arrived?"
"I don't know. Mrs. Biddings, that's the vic's wife, she answered the door as soon as we rang the bell - like she was waitin' for it to ring," Richter replied, annoyed with the interruption in his story.
"Do you remember hearing the lock turn?" Grissom persisted.
"It could be very important," Catherine added. "Try to remember."
Richter seemed extraordinarily proud of himself when he was able to dredge up some memory of the events of less than half an hour prior. "I guess...maybe I did. Coulda been a branch snappin', but I definitely heard a noise like a lock."
"Thank you, Officer," Grissom said. "Please, continue your story."
Clearing his throat, Officer Richter continued. "Where was I? Oh, yeah, we got here, an' Mrs. Biddings opened the door and she's screamin' and carryin' on. She's about forty, maybe forty-five, if that matters." Grissom nodded and Richter continued. "We secured the scene an' took her statement, then another blue-and-white came an' took her to the hospital. She says Mr. Biddings himself locked the house up tight, top to bottom, turned the alarm system on an' everything. She headed to bed at like, eleven - she says she remembers 'cause the news was startin'. Says Mr. Biddings usually fell asleep on the couch. She woke up to pee - her words, not mine - checked the living room, and the vic was gone. This was about an hour ago. She called nine-one-one right away and they told her not to touch anythin'. 'Course, if she whacked him, it prob'ly won't do a lotta good to tell her not to mess up the house. Oh, and her theory on her husband's disappearing act? Aliens took 'im."
"Ah. I see," Grissom said with a wry smile. "Well, if you'll excuse us, my partner and I have work to do."
Richter shrugged and waved to the house. "Have at it. Holler if ya need me."
Grissom stepped into the house, holding the door for Catherine, then closing it behind her.
"'Ah, I see'?" she quoted him. "What's that supposed to mean?"
"It means I didn't want to agree with nor disagree with the officer. For all I know, aliens did kidnap Mr. Biddings right off his couch," Grissom replied evenly. "Until the evidence shows me one way or another, I'm going to keep an open mind."
"Aliens, right. Have you started taking some new drug that your second-in-command should be aware of?" she teased him. She set her case down near the door and opened it, checking the entryway and back of the door for visible finger- or shoeprints. When she found none, Catherine dug in her kit for dusting powder and a brush, then went to work on the brass doorknob and decorative glass pane, as Grissom headed across the room to check out the sliding glass doors.
"The only drug I'd ever need, my lovely Catherine, is sildenafil citrate, and that would only be to keep up with you."
Catherine laughed out loud, partly at Grissom and partly because she'd discovered a usable palm print on the stained glass cutout in the door. "You know, some women would consider that sexual harassment."
"Lucky for me, you're not most women."
Uttering a soft giggle, Catherine informed Grissom, "I've got a good palm print."
"I have his brother," Grissom replied. "Looks like a thumbprint. How the hell? C'mere a sec."
"Hang on, I think I've got something else." Catherine reached for the Luminol and sprayed the floor of the foyer. Reaching up, she clicked off the lights and immediately murmured, "That must've been some fight." The entire floor glowed with an eerie blue light, where the chemical revealed the presence of blood - the foyer had once been covered in the sticky red substance, and someone had obviously tried to clean it up. "I've got blood," she called to Grissom, setting the Luminol bottle down. She swabbed a sample and tucked the evidence baggie away beside the others she'd gathered so far, in an empty spot in her kit. "Now, what'd you want to show me?" Catherine crossed the room and stood by Grissom, peering at the glass doors.
"This." Grissom pointed at a thumbprint, and two other fingerprints, spaced but near enough to be part of the same set. "Do they look like the same hand?"
Catherine twisted her hand, trying to line up her fingertips with the prints. "Nope, doesn't seem possible. Couldn't you have done that yourself?" she asked, mildly exasperated.
"Yes, but smell them," Grissom suggested.
"Smell them? The prints?"
"Smell the prints."
"Okay." Catherine looked confused, but did as he asked, leaning over to sniff the thumbprint. "Smells like...oranges." She leaned further to the right and took a whiff of the other prints. "They all do."
"They could be from the same person, but why grab the door twice, first with your thumb only, then with two fingers? You wouldn't have enough power in either grip to slide it open. Then the question becomes, if these are prints from two different people, why do they both have the same citrus scent? Is it a genetic abnormality, or just an orange-scented cleaning product?"
"You ask too many questions," Catherine said, laying a hand on Grissom's shoulder with a smile.
"That's my job."
Catherine was caught mid-reply by a loud crash. She spun around, and it took a moment for her to process exactly what she was seeing. "Shit!" she exclaimed, her hands flying to her hips. "Son of a *bitch*."
"You kiss your daughter with that--" Grissom stopped as he, too, turned his head and caught sight of the foyer. "Shit," he cursed in agreement."
Catherine fervently wished there were a bigger curse-word vocabulary to choose from. The words she knew just didn't seem to cut it. Her evidence kit was overturned, and the contents were spilled out over the foyer floor. The evidence she'd collected, and some of her smaller tools, had been swiped. She darted outside, hollering for Officer Richter.
"What's the problem, sweetheart?" the cop called from his spot across the street.
Catherine growled low in her throat. "My evidence kit was ransacked, just now. I only turned my back for a minute. The guy had to have come in through the front door. Did you see him?"
"Didn't see anybody."
Her growl deepening, Catherine resisted the urge to pelt the officer with the acorns scattered all over the lawn. "You *had* to see him, there was no other entrance - Grissom and I were by the back door."
"I swear, not a soul." Richter shrugged. "Just me, Jerry an' the neighborhood mutts. Sorry, babe."
Leveling an icy glare in his direction, Catherine pointed a slender finger at him. "We'll discuss your unprofessional misogynism later. For now, just keep your eyes open for a perp with a handful of evidence bags." She turned and stalked back into the house. "They let anybody into the police academy nowadays," Catherine seethed.
Chuckling, Grissom replied, "I don't think we'll be recovering that evidence tonight. You'll just have to do it again," he added serenely - serenely, Catherine supposed, because no one had absconded with *his* stuff, forcing him to do his work over.
"Yeah, yeah. This sucks," she grumbled succinctly. "I've gotta drive all the way back to the lab and get new supplies, then process the foyer again, and then a third time to see if I can find trace from the bastard who tipped my kit."
Grissom rose from his crouched position and brushed invisible dirt off his knees. Taking pity on Catherine, he offered, "Look, I'll save you some time. If you promise to watch my kit like a hawk, I'll get you a new one and help you process the foyer. Deal?"
"Deal," Catherine smiled up at Grissom, reaching into her pocket and tossing him the keys. "Careful there, Griss. Someone might call you 'human' one day."
"I don't think I'm in any real danger of that happening. I just have a weakness for redheads," he deadpanned on his way out the door.
"Strawberry blond!" she called after him, laughing despite the extra work ahead of her. Another hour or two on a crime scene with Grissom was time well spent.
As Grissom stepped out of the house, he didn't head around back toward the Tahoe. Instead, he strode straight across the street and shot Richter the same glare Catherine had, a few minutes prior. Cool as ice, he demanded, "My partner will be alone in there for the next hour. I want one of you posted at the door until I get back. You step away five seconds before you see me hit that front door, and I'll have your badge. Understood?" Catherine had been attacked at a crime scene once, by a perp who hung around. Grissom wasn't about to let it happen again on his watch.
Richter's partner, DeSalvo, nodded quickly, and Richter soon followed. Grissom stood like a guard at Buckingham Palace until Richter nudged his partner, who took off across the lawn and settled himself in the doorway. Then Grissom nodded in satisfaction, making his way to the SUV. Catherine would wail on him later for it, but he preferred that she be in one piece when she berated him.
Catherine eyed DeSalvo warily. "Did Grissom tell you to baby-sit me?"
"No, ma'am."
She liked him more than Richter already. "You're lying."
"Yes, ma'am."
Chuckling, Catherine shook her head. Overprotective little shit. She knew that later, she'd have to set Grissom straight about making decisions for her, but deep down, Catherine appreciated the concern.
* * *
He returned within the hour, as promised, and Officer DeSalvo had not moved from his post. Grissom nodded approvingly to the cop, who took his leave and strutted back across the street to his partner. Grissom stepped carefully into the house, avoiding the Luminol-covered foyer floor. "Got your kit," he called.
"Thank God. I am so sick of this." Catherine stepped away from her makeshift fuming hood, fashioned out of a styrofoam cup, a pipe cleaner and a tube of super glue.
Grissom stared at the mini-hood in puzzlement. "Why didn't you just use my kit?" he asked, nonetheless impressed with her ingenuity.
"You've got a hood in there?" Catherine asked teasingly. "I borrowed your dusting powder, but I found this in the front bushes and the powder wasn't sticking." She lifted the cup and coughed a little as the super glue fumes snuck up her nose. "There." Catherine took a pen and slid it into the open mouth of the Coke can, lifting it off the ground. "I knew it!" she exclaimed with pride. "Full handprint. Boy, they get dumber every day."
The pair worked in companionable silence, broken by the occasional teasing barb, for the next few hours. When they had finished processing the living room and bedroom - the last two rooms Mr. Biddings had been in, according to his wife - they headed for the car. On the way, Grissom stopped to speak to Officers Richter and DeSalvo one last time. "Officer Richter?" he called.
Richter turned, and when he saw Grissom, he sighed heavily. Crossing the street, the police officer asked, "Somethin' I can do for ya?"
"Just one last question. Where were you and your partner about three hours ago?"
Richter scowled. "Right there," he pointed to their squad car. "Where we been all damn night while you were playin' freakin' Macgyver in th' house."
Catching Grissom's direction, Catherine smiled warmly. "I'm sorry, Officer Richter, what my partner *meant* to ask was, did you or your partner take any breaks? Perhaps to go up the road to the Exxon, to use the restroom, get a cup of coffee?"
The officer's mood was much more accommodating when he nodded and replied, "Yeah, Jerry took a coupla breaks to get us snacks, and we took turns goin' to the bathroom."
"And was one of those breaks just before my evidence kit was attacked?" Catherine went on.
"Yeah. You tryin' to imply somethin', lady?" Richter growled.
"Not a thing, Officer. Just trying to get a complete picture. Thanks for your help."
They climbed into the car and Grissom shook his head instantly. "I ask a simple question and get my head bitten off. You flash your pearly whites and he's got instant recall."
Catherine smiled, showing off the teeth in question. "It's not my fault they're so stunning. Blame Colgate."
"You should always use that power for good," Grissom deadpanned.
"I'm very, very good - ask around."
* * *
They arrived at the lab, and Catherine dropped several dozen items off with Greg and a few more with the other techs.
"We should take the opportunity to eat breakfast while Greg's working on the prints," Grissom suggested, as they traversed the hall to his office.
"Grissom, are you asking me out?" Catherine asked, her face registering amusement as she toyed with him.
He quirked his mouth, fear darting across his eyes as they scanned the hallway for anyone who might have overheard. "I'm offering you raspberry crepes," Grissom corrected.
"My favorite. I can't believe you remembered," she said with a winning smile. "In that case, I'm all yours. Let me just drop these off." Catherine held up a manila envelope with bulging sides. "Crime scene photos. Maybe we can get them processed while we eat."
* * *
Breakfast was over much too quickly for Catherine's taste, and they were back at the lab. She began sorting through the crime scene photos, matching each set of pictures with the evidence they represented. She had worked over about half the trace materials they'd collected by the time Greg came bouncing through her door.
"Kiss me quick or lose me forever!" he declared, puckering his lips.
"Give me the print results or die slowly," Catherine bantered with a grin.
"The sliding door prints match the doorknob prints, which match the prints off the medication bottle Grissom got from Mr. Biddings' nightstand," Greg beamed.
"So Mr. Biddings tried to open his back door, then walked out the front without setting off the alarm?" Catherine frowned.
Greg shrugged. "There might be a delay on the alarm. Some of them have that, where you can set the alarm from the inside, and if you get out within, like, sixty seconds, it doesn't trigger it."
"Possibly. But that still wouldn't explain the prints on the back door," she said.
Thinking about that for a long minute, Greg finally chuckled and offered, "Maybe Mr. Biddings was drunk and got confused about which way he wanted to go. Anyway, I'm still working on the palm print from the front door, and the Coke can."
"Thanks, Greg." Catherine rolled her eyes and walked away with a little smile.
"Oh, Cath, one more thing? I got a hit on the trace from the foyer near your kit. Looks like your perp's a feline."
"A cat stole my evidence?" Catherine suddenly recalled leaving the door ajar to avoid smudging any prints as she'd worked on the foyer floor. "A cat," she repeated with a chuckle. "Great." She strode down the hall, and approached Grissom's office, knocking and entering without waiting for his response. "Greg got a match on your prints."
"Our prints," Grissom corrected, looking up from his laptop. "What'd he find?"
"They all match Mr. Biddings. Oh, and the perp on my kit burglary was apparently man's other best friend. A cat." Catherine chuckled again at the idea.
"Cats are extremely intelligent creatures," Grissom began a lecture, and Catherine cut him off with a wave of her hand.
"Have you figured out why the prints smell like oranges?" Catherine asked, rounding his desk to peer over the edge of his laptop screen.
"No. At this point, it's looking more and more like scented Pine-Sol."
"Maybe it was a Mob hit," Catherine suggested. "They always leave a clean crime scene."
Sara groaned from the doorway. "That was one of the worst puns I've ever heard."
Catherine turned with a grin and shrugged. "I didn't have much to work with."
"Sorry to interrupt," Sara added belatedly, "but I just heard something I thought you two might be interested in. Your vic's wife claims alien abduction, right?"
Grissom shook his head in disbelief. "Strange news spreads fast."
"Greg's got a big mouth," Catherine put forth her explanation.
"That, too," Sara agreed. "Big Mouth told me that this weekend there's a huge UFO convention out near Area 51. Anniversary of the Roswell crash, I think."
Catherine turned to Grissom with a grin. "And you didn't play hooky?"
Ignoring her facetious comment, Grissom began to tap on his keyboard. "Roswell '03," he read from a website. "Don't pass up your chance to get abducted by history."
Sara laughed and commented, "Jeez, some people need lives." Before Catherine or Grissom could comment, she blushed and ducked out of the office, calling, "Well, just thought you should know, good luck."
Catherine sank into one of Grissom's visitors chairs. "You think our missing person ran away to join the alien-watchers?" she asked.
"Anything's possible. I'm going to wait to see what else Greg comes up with."
* * *
What Greg came up with was another question, rather than a solution.
Grissom read the sheet Greg had given him. "Seems the prints on the Coke can you found in the bushes--"
"Were too neat, too pristine," Catherine interrupted. "I think it was a plant."
"Greg agrees. They belonged to our missing person, but Mr. Biddings didn't hold the can himself."
Catherine narrowed her eyes. "Then how'd the prints get there?"
"Scotch tape. Greg found residue in the prints and tested it - match for common, clear household tape," Grissom explained.
"So someone taped Mr. Biddings' fingers before he disappeared, then transferred the prints to a Coke can and left it in the bushes for us to find?" Catherine surmised. "Still doesn't tell us where he is."
"It does if you look at this." Grissom slid a picture across the desk to Catherine, who leaned over and picked it up.
She stared at it for a long moment. "It's a picture of the yard. Virtually undisturbed."
Grissom handed her a magnifying glass. "Take a closer look," he suggested. When she did, Catherine murmured in surprise. Grissom chuckled, though he now suspected the man's disappearance was no laughing matter. "A tiny little crop circle," he confirmed Catherine's silent discovery. "A clear spot, about the size of a grown man's stance, in the acorns littering the yard."
"But...aliens?" Catherine asked, meeting Grissom's eyes.
"Not aliens. An alien *staging*. Think about it." Grissom began to enumerate the points. "He disappeared in the middle of the night, seemingly from his own house - classic alien abduction lore. Then you found a soda can in the bushes, probably put there to make us think he stepped outside to see the UFO and they 'snatched' him. Mr. Biddings' prints on both doors might just be random prints. It was his house, after all."
"What about the palm print?"
Grissom held his hand out, palm up. "Matches the sample Mrs. Biddings consented to give us, but she opened the door for the police, so that would explain it. At least now we have enough to put out an APB for anyone fitting Mr. Biddings description."
Catherine nodded, accepting his explanation of the evidence without question. It was all very logical, except one thing. "But if Mrs. Biddings killed her husband and staged her house to look like an alien abduction, where'd she put the body? She doesn't look strong enough to carry a body very far, and we didn't see any signs of disturbance around the house."
Grissom slid his glasses off and rubbed the bridge of his nose slowly. "That's the only thing I can't figure out. Unless..."
"Unless," Catherine responded at the same time, her eyes lighting up as they came to the same conclusion, "unless *Mr.* Biddings did the staging." She stopped and leaned back in the chair with a sigh. "But why would he go to all the trouble of staging an alien abduction? Why not just file for divorce? They didn't have much property to fight over."
"They were married for twenty-five years. Maybe he just couldn't take it anymore and wanted out immediately," Grissom suggested.
"Oh, for God's sake," Catherine snapped playfully. "You think men always have it so rough, being nagged by their wives. Well, maybe if they got off their lazy asses and took out the garbage once in a while, their wives wouldn't need to nag them!"
Grissom was still chuckling to himself as Catherine strode off down the hall to see what else the evidence might tell her.
* * *
"Mrs. Biddings," Captain Brass said calmly, "tell us again what happened."
"I've told you already," Mrs. Biddings moaned sobbingly. "I woke up, and Herman was gone. Just...gone. They took him, I know they did."
"'They' who?" Catherine asked gently.
"They! The...aliens," Mrs. Biddings whispered.
Catherine nodded empathetically. "Which aliens?" she asked, as Brass glared at her.
"The ones from Roswell, the ones he's always talking about. He's seen UFOs five times, you know," she confided in Catherine.
"Five times? Wow. Mrs. Biddings, listen," Catherine said, all sweetness, "what we found at your home wasn't evidence of an alien abduction. It was evidence of a staging - that means someone tried to make your house look like aliens had been there, but they failed. Now, do you think it's possible that your husband wanted a divorce but was afraid to tell you?"
"No!" Mrs. Biddings cried. "There's no way my Herman wanted a ... divorce," she hesitated. "We're in love. Have been for twenty-five years."
"Can you think of anyone who might've wanted to hurt your husband?" Catherine asked.
Mrs. Biddings shook her head quickly. "No, not a soul. Herman was so quiet, he never caused any problems."
"Thank you, Mrs. Biddings." Catherine stood, turning the interview back over to Brass as she left the interrogation room.
Grissom met her halfway down the hall. "Sorry I'm late, Warrick needed me on his assault case. How'd it go?"
Catherine shook her head once, firmly. "She's not the one. This woman is clueless. Either Mr. Biddings staged his own disappearance, or someone else kidnapped him and staged the house. My money's on Herman."
* * *
It was past the end of shift, and everyone was catching up on their reports from the night, when Grissom received a call from Brass. Catherine didn't look up from her laptop, which she had back-to-back with Grissom's, in 'Battleship' fashion, on his desk. She didn't want him to think she was eavesdropping, although she could hear every word, being less than three feet away.
"They did? Fantastic. Check that one off. Thanks, Jim." He hung up and peered over his glasses at Catherine. "The police found Herman Biddings."
"Where was he?"
"The Roswell anniversary celebration. Turns out he's a real alien nut, just like his wife said. He's gone to this convention every year since 1975. Well, this year, her sister was going to be in town, and Mrs. Biddings wanted her husband there for the visit, so she had to put her foot down - no Roswell. According to his statement, Mr. Biddings faked his own abduction for a weekend away."
"No kidding?" Catherine grinned. "Well, that's kind of a letdown. After all this, I was kind of hoping I'd get to meet Marvin the Martian."
Grissom pursed his lips, smiling faintly. "At least the case is closed." He shut his computer down and closed the top. "Are you about ready to head out?"
"Yeah, lemme just get my jacket." Catherine disappeared and was back in a moment with her jacket.
The drive to her house was quiet, save for the soft classical music Grissom chose for the ride. They pulled into Catherine's driveway and Grissom parked the car. The sun was peeking over the horizon, brightening the Las Vegas morning, as Catherine led him into the living room. She thanked the baby-sitter profusely and the girl left. "Lindsey!" Catherine called. "Time to get up. Uncle Grissom and I are here!"
The responding shout was unintelligible, but Catherine assured Grissom it was 'I'll be down in a minute.' "Which, as you know, means more like half an hour," she chuckled softly. "You hungry?" Catherine asked, leading him into the kitchen.
"Starved. Seems like breakfast was ages ago."
Catherine opened the fridge and peered in. "You want a burger? I think we might have some leftover pizza here somewhere."
Grissom shook his head, stepping across the room. "I can get it myself."
"It's okay, Griss, I don't mind," she assured him.
"Really," Grissom insisted. "Let me make it. And after that, I'll take out the garbage."
Raising an eyebrow, Catherine stepped back. "Gil, what's gotten into you?"
"I don't want to end up like Herman Biddings," Grissom said with a grin.
Confused, Catherine laughed aloud. "Sneaking off to Roswell to look for UFOs?"
"No," Grissom replied, leaning around the counter to brush a kiss across Catherine's lips. "Sleeping on the couch."
THE END